Material collection apparatus including a truck with a front or side loader are well known, particularly for refuse collection. One class of refuse collection apparatuses and methods utilizes special containers which are filled by the customers of a refuse collection company. Front loading or side loading vehicles go from customer to customer and empty the containers into the truck bed.
In one prior art material collector of this class, multiple part units are mounted permanently to a vehicle. These multipart units grip material containers or slide into pockets built into the material containers. Generally, the material containers are trash containers. Prior art systems of this type are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,210,890 and 5,639,201. These systems have a disadvantage in that if either the vehicle or the multipart unit for gripping the containers is not operable, then neither the vehicle nor the multipart gripping apparatus are usable. The only substitute is another vehicle containing the apparatus for picking up the material containers.